


One Night In Dublin

by selkieskin



Category: Hollyoaks
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Character Study, Closeted Character, Crying, Drunk Dialing, Drunken Confessions, Drunkenness, Gay Bar, Gen, Heartbreak, Identity Issues, Internalized Homophobia, Loneliness, M/M, Sexuality Crisis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 21:38:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8940331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/selkieskin/pseuds/selkieskin
Summary: John Paul ended things with Craig at the airport, so Craig went off to University in Dublin alone. But one night, after only a few weeks in this new place and very drunk, heartbreak starts to get the better of him.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I know it's been genuinely about 10 years since this storyline happened on a TV soap, but it really resonated with me at the time and still does. I hope there are still some people out there who will enjoy it. Also, Craig Dean drunk is something everyone needs to see more of.

Craig wasn't having fun.

Craig didn't think he'd had fun for... well, realistically it was only about three weeks, but it seemed like forever ago. A world away, anyway. He tried to take an aggressive swig of his beer only to realise to his drunken surprise that there was nothing left in it. He put it down and turned to complain about that to someone, but there was no one there.

He looked around the club. It was quite hard to tell with all the lights and the people, but he didn't think he recognised anyone. He'd come out with his new coursemates, technically – they were an alright bunch of lads, but they weren't that interested in him. With the blow he'd suffered at the airport still fresh in his mind ( _John Paul saying through his tears 'I deserve better', with Craig desperately wanting to kiss him but not being able to bring himself to_ ) he'd reverted back to being angry and closed off, trying to keep himself quiet so he didn't end up snapping at his potential new friends. Which wasn't the best way to make anyone like you. And Craig was always a clingy drunk, but now there was nobody there to cling to, just air.

He picked up the beer once again, about to raise it to his lips but it clicked in time and he just commented “nope” to himself as he dropped it on the floor and staggered towards the cloakroom. Five minutes later, he'd picked up his coat and ditched the club, walking off into the night.

-

It took him a minute to consciously work out where he was going. He wasn't going home to the student accommodation. He was taking a detour to something that had caught his eye as he'd been trying to find his lecture halls. It shouldn't have caught his eye, but it did, and he was going to have a look. Seeing as no one cared about him here, nobody would ask, and nobody would stop him.

And there it was. 'Pantibar' was lit up in red neon on the outside up the wall, and people were outside, chatting loudly and smoking. A faded-looking large rainbow flag hung by the doorway, and two of the people – both very muscular men, one balding and shirtless – were snogging while their friends around them completely ignored it and kept chatting. A small group of drag queens in massive high heels stood off to one side, laughing at the story one of them was telling, bracelets jangling. 

A gay bar.

Craig didn't go in. He didn't even go near it. It was so alien to him, it was so not what he was like. So not what John Paul was like, either. Craig laughed ruefully to himself as he imagined what John Paul would have to say about the music – he wouldn't have got John Paul near that place in a million years. John Paul, who wasn't here with him to help him. John Paul...

He swore to himself as he settled himself leaning against the wall, in the shadows, a little out of the way down the road so that nobody would see him. He must have left his volume control with his sobriety, though, because that “shit” was louder than he thought and one of the drag queens with an orange wig clocked him. He froze, defences ready, colour draining from his face as he realised he'd been seen. They looked at each other for a few seconds, before luckily the conversation the drag queens were in took another turn and they all started laughing at whatever it was, and the attention shifted off him.

Craig's heart was pounding. It wasn't that he was homophobic, he told himself. It was just that he knew what people thought of people like these, and Dublin was supposed to be a new start. He didn't know if he wanted to face this yet, didn't think he was capable of weathering what people might throw at him in this new place where he had no one. He wasn't like them anyway. He wasn't like them, so it didn't matter. This was a stupid experiment. He stood there and stared anyway, for a long time, stared at the two men that were kissing and trying to make it not matter, trying to imagine himself there, cynically seeing if he could.

Next to filter out of the bar were a group of friends much closer to his age – they were students, maybe, or at least in their early twenties – who grouped together and all set off in the same direction, mercifully the opposite one to where Craig was standing. His heart jumped as he noticed one of the boys in the back of the group was wearing a stripy jumper and just casually holding his boyfriend's hand, and some stupid unrelenting part of his heart jumped and said _'John Paul'_ , and then at the guy next to him with their fingers interlaced _'that's me, right there, there I go'_ as if he was suddenly looking at himself in some terrifying alternate reality and John Paul was with him and they'd gone to that place together and Craig wasn't ashamed, wasn't afraid, that he was being everything that John Paul wanted him to be...

It was like vertigo. Craig felt sick. He covered his face with his hand and just broke down and cried, shrinking into the shadows and just letting himself feel everything. The anger that John Paul had left him. The guilt that he couldn't be confident enough for him, or make John Paul matter more than his stupid fears. The terror that this had become a part of his life now. The confusion between who he was, and who he was supposed to be, who he wanted to be. The loneliness of this place that he'd wanted to be so good, but really, it was just like everywhere else, nothing had changed because he hadn't changed. The loneliness of being without his best friend and the man he loved.

“Hey, kid, are you alright?” came a soft Irish lilt.

It was the drag queen who'd seen him earlier. Up close her eyeshadow was really startling, with eyebrows pencilled in practically in the hairline and everything in-between filled with rainbow glitter. He hadn't realised that she – he? – had got so close. He was so surprised he nearly toppled over.

“No, I'm... just lost.”

“Are you sure? Do you need help getting home, or?”

“No thanks, no, I know where I'm going, I-”

“Look, I didn't mean to frighten you off, I just thought you looked like you needed-”

“No, I'm fine,” he did his best impression of a nonchalant grin and backed away, hands up. “Really, really, I'm fine. Really.”

“Aye,” she said sharply gesturing to him to stop, “well, no offence kid, but I don't believe you. You look pure freaked out. Do you... want to talk about it? Or is there anyone I can call for you? Or a taxi?”

“No, no no no no no,” replied Craig, and then laughed again, that drunken honk of a laugh. “There's no one here you can call.”

“Hey, wait-”

“I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I'm just...” he was backing away now fast and escaping; “I'm just... lost.”

“A taxi, then? Please let me call you a taxi. Are you one of the students at the uni?”

“No, no, I'm just lost, I'm just lost...”

“Hey-”

He sort of knew he wasn't making any sense, but that was it, he went off down the road and staggered hurriedly towards the direction of his accommodation. It wasn't 'home' yet, it didn't feel like home, home was where...

He hadn't been paying attention to where he was going and tripped over his own feet. Usually when he was like this there was someone to catch him. Now he just lay there on the concrete, and felt his bones like lead and the grit rough against his cheek and the wind blowing cold on the tears on his face. His heart sank as he realised there was nobody here to help him up, and he almost didn't want to.

But no. There was nobody here to take care of him now, and whose fault was that? John Paul should be here. John Paul, who had left him. John Paul, who had left him here to lie in the street alone.

The anger got him up. He couldn't remember how he got back, but he did.

-

The flat seemed empty. Everyone was probably still out, with their own new friends. Or boyfriends. Or girlfriends.

 _'Mates don't get jealous of, of boyfriends...'_ That familiar voice in his head.

He lay down on his bed, shoes still on, on top of the covers. He took his phone out and scrolled to John Paul's name. He stared at it in silence for a while, just letting the enormity and the horror take over. He wasn't going to call him. He'd told himself he wasn't going to.

He pressed call anyway.

The phone rang once. The bile rose in his throat, his heart fluttering with anxiety. He didn't even plan this – what was he going to say? How did he even feel? Was he angry, was he sad? It rang again. He was sad, definitely sad. He was going to say to John Paul that he wanted him back, that he loved him and he was sorry. It rang a third time. Then stopped.

“H-hello?” said Craig, voice choked.

No answer. Then he looked at the phone. His body went cold as he realised – his call had been rejected.

“You can't stop me speaking to you,” he said to John Paul, even though he wasn't on the other end. “You can't stop me speaking to you. We're best mates. And I love you. I love you, John Paul.”

Silence again. Craig sobbed. He could feel how his body hurt with it, how it ached with the need for things to be different, how the crying tensed his muscles and made them sore, how his heart ached after all it had suffered.

“I went... to a gay bar. Yes, _me_. I just needed to look and see, and I saw you there, and me, and we were _happy_ , and I'm just...” he broke down again. “I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I wanted that right then – more than anything in the world. And, and what does that say about me? I'm...”

He had to calm his breathing down a bit.

“I'm sorry. I'm sorry I messed you around, and I lost my best mate over it, I lost... I lost you. Those people, there, you were right to leave me because I'll never be them, I can't. I'm not... I'm not like that. I'm not gay. It's just you. Yeah? And I love you more than I've ever loved... anyone.”

Then anger overtook him again. He clenched the phone in his hand and brought it close to his mouth, screwing up his face and shouting into it.

“How could you leave me? We were perfect together, you and me, like it always was, and you left me? How dare you, how dare you make your decision like that just when I thought we had it all planned out, how dare you ignore me, how dare you leave me here alone. You pushed, and you pushed, and you never even let me catch my breath, I mean... you were always so far ahead, you didn't fucking care about me. You knew I wasn't ready. I threw everything I had, everything, I threw it all away, all for you. You left me here, to cope with this all alone. You...”

His grip on the phone loosened.

“Come and get me,” he pleaded, suddenly. “I hate it here. Please come and get me. I miss you. Please, JP, please. Please come and get me...”

Exhaustion must have taken over him then, because he finally went to sleep.


End file.
